Rating: 

I am 100% sure Mr. Molinaro's SQL Cookbook will save me dozens of hours of navigating through (a) the obtuse documentation of the three vendors and trying to sort out their respective dialects, and (b) the many well-meaning but poorly written SQL help sites that come up in Google. Indeed, as far as I am concerned, the book has already more than paid for itself in the time saved. A key strength of this cookbook (in addition to being very well written, edited, and produced) is it is very logically organized and makes it quite easy to find the topic you want.

The only reason I gave it a four-star rating is that it doesn't have all the answers I need. If it did, it would have been a goldmine! But, seriously, if you are "SQL-challenged" like some of us (i.e., not an SQL guru), and you think your time is worth more than $40 an hour, you should get this book, even if you are working with just one of the three SQL platforms. If you are working with two or more versions, get this book, regardless!

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Mr. Molinaro for doing a great job helping me devote the time saved to other equally challenging adventures, like golf!